Jason Lancaster

My mother convinced my father to start climbing with us, so last week was the first time I’ve seen him climb. Pretty cool if you ask me! It was his second time climbing and he did a couple 5.7′s. So now the group is even bigger. I don’t think I’ll be able to convince them to climb outdoors anytime soon but perhaps after some more time they’ll begin to open to the idea.

I worked on my hardest top route to date that day, a 5.11c/d. I don’t normally work on really hard top rope climbs (I prefer to boulder hard) but I think I was a little inspired by seeing both my mom and dad as well as having Chris there with us. After 3 tries I was clean up until the second to last hold. After the fall, I’d perform the last 2 holds clean but I just couldn’t get a good rest in between. I’ll work on this again, probably next week. If I can start pulling 5.11c’s off consistently, I’d be really happy to begin doing projects on 5.12′s.

I’m still stuck on v6 boulder problems. I’ve done one v7 but for the most part the 6′s really take some work to complete. Emily and I went down to Rockville’s Earth Treks to visit a friend of hers and climb down there a couple weekends ago. There was this slick v4 with a dyno into a 2 finger pocket that I really don’t think was a v4. It was just totally insane when I stuck it. I love that flying-then-catching-a-super-tiny-flake-with-nothing-on-it feeling.